Convergence and Divergence Issues in Strategic Management – An Asian Perspective on the Balanced Scorecard

Global competitive pressures shape an enterprise’s focus on strategic management systems, and in particular the Balanced Scorecard; this shift suggests that global companies adopt a handful of management best practices, most of which originate in the West. Divergence factors such as national culture, leadership styles and human resource management practices underscore the trend towards convergence of global management practices; however, Asian empirical evidence on the effectiveness of such practices is limited as is the impact of Asian Balanced Scorecard contextual variables. This paper considers a conceptual framework, based on the Balanced Scorecard, in which to consider convergence and divergence impacts on developing high performance cultures in Asian contexts. A Balanced Scorecard implementation case study undertaken by the Central Bank of Indonesia is the basis for discussing Asian firms’ challenges in adopting Western management practices.